Book 1 Jasmine Evans and the Lightning Thief
by shazzygirl
Summary: Just the Percy Jackson books with my OC Jasmine Evans who is a daughter of Poseidon. All information is on my profile, so read the book as I cannot explain it.
1. Chapter 1

**Book 1 - Jasmine Evans and the Lightning Thief**

 **Author's Note: I got this idea when I wrote Zoe Evans, however I chose to make Jasmine a cousin of Harry and Lily and James are still alive. There is magic, however in this story, Hogwarts isn't what it is cracked up to be. All the links I use will be on my profile along with all the characters as I do not want to put it as a chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, Percy Jackson or Narnia, all the passages in books and dialogue from movies will be written in** _italics_ **so you know what it is that I definitely do not own.**

 **If you want any more information, review or PM me, but the main info that you may need is on my profile.**

 **Chapter 1 – Leaving Home/Going to Camp**

 **Wednesday May 31** **st** **1995**

*Jasmine's POV*

"…have you go everything? Your weapons and books and…"

I interrupted Mum. "Yes mum, I have got everything either in my Cabin or in the suitcases."

I should probably explain myself. I am Jasmine Evans, I was born on the 21st June 1982, the Summer Solstice, to Gorden Evans, Helena Smith and Poseidon, the God of the Sea. Yeah, my mum found out she couldn't have another child so they decided to have a threesome with a god. I am a demigod, the first mortal daughter of Poseidon, and Cabin Counsellor of Cabin 3. My mother, Helena Smith, is a demigod as well, a daughter of Apollo. Her brother and sisters are also demigods.

I am going, for my 12th Summer, to Camp Half Blood which I do not get why my parents are making a fuss over as I am a yearlong camper as well but I visit for about two months before the Summer. I have 12 beads on my necklace which means that I have survived 12 summers currently more than anyone else had, including my mother and her siblings. I am turning 13 this summer and I go every Summer to Camp, the first few was with my mum or aunts as I was too young to go on my own. I am going to miss my siblings and my cousins, well some of them, as I do every time I go, especially Peter, my older brother who I have practically became best friends with. Then I have my younger half siblings; Susan and Damien, the twins, Edmund who can be quite…mean to everyone, and Lucinda or as we call her, Lucy. Then, four years ago there were Krystal and William. I would go on about my cousins but I have a feeling that you will get to know them soon enough.

We all are currently in our connected houses in Finchley, although I know that each of our different family members will be moving to different parts of London soon enough, probably after they finish the war.

Mum then sighed. "I know but I do worry about you, you could be a child of the Prophecy."

Ah the Prophecy; I should explain but I do not know the wording. It means that when a child of the 'Big Three' a.k.a. Zeus, Poseidon and Hades, turn 16, they can cause the world as they know it to be destroyed.

"Lena, she will be fine." My Dad then stated from his position next to his current wife.

Yeah every one of the family is invited to this 'get together' but it just means that they say goodbye to me until before they go back to school in September. Oh and eat.

The party then went on for most of the day until the evening when it came to the time in which I would mist travel to Camp. Hecate chose me as a Champion so she took it upon herself to teach me how to use the mist to my advantage.

Then it came for me to say goodbye which usually goes in the same order as every year – those I least like to my parents but I have to do my cousins first. So the order goes like this: Eustace, Eugene, Dudley, Daisy, Harry, Joanna, Chrys, Daniel, Hannah and Charlie – the latter four are only one or two years old, but the ones just a bit older I do not like as much. Then comes my aunts and uncles and step mothers, practically in the same order: Peyton, Uncle Harold, Uncle Vernon, Aunt Francine, Aunt Petunia, Aunt Lilian, Aunt Tulip, Grace, Uncle James, Uncle Logan, Aunt Eleanor, Aunt Charlotte, Uncle Zach, Uncle Cameron, Uncle John, Aunt Haley and Aunt Lara. Yeah I really do not like some of my family because they act so uptight or full of themselves. Then comes my siblings: William and Krystal, since they are the youngest, Edmund, Susan, Damian, Lucy and then Peter. There is a reason why I do it in that order. Then it is my parents and then I go.

Literally, once I say goodbye to my parents I leave for the whole summer which I did.

*Line Break*

As I reached the Camp entrance I knew something was wrong, well I should have known already, the weather was horrible, there was a storm but no lightning. Odd.

When I entered Camp I went to the Big House to meet with Chiron and Mr D (who is actually Dionysus but is grounded) to tell them I am back for the summer and to collect my summer schedule.

"Jasmine, welcome back." Chiron greeted me with a smile. "It's good to see you again."

Giving him a hug, I replied "It's good to see you too."

"Jessica." Mr D nodded his head to me in greeting.

"Mr D." I mocked him.

Chiron handed me my schedule and also the list of campers since I was leader/head, being a camper for most of my life. Because of this, I did not have to wear the camp t-shirt as is required. Instead, I wear my black leather trousers which were tight/baggy enough to fit, move and to strap weapons on my body. Then I wear a shirt, one in my collection, with one of my multiple black leather jackets that zip up. I then finish my look up with black leather boots with chains that go halfway between my ankles and knees. I store my daggers and knifes in the pockets that they have inside them. I am not a goth, I just like wearing the leather clothing when I train. Currently, I am wearing light blue jeans, with dark blue ankle boots, a plain turquoise tee and a dark blue hoodie. My favourite colours are blue, green and purple. Oh shoot, I should probably describe what I look like. I am of average height for my age, with pure midnight black hair that goes to my mid-back, green eyes that seem to reflect the sea at times and changes colours/shades with my emotions, and I have a pale complexion. Apart from my paleness, I look like a female version of my dad, Poseidon. I do not wear make-up, never in my life have I worn make-up. I have ADHD and dyslexia but I do not have to worry about school, well I do but I am taking all my exams when I am 15, since I am technically home schooled.

Anyway, I am getting off topic, thank you ADHD. My schedule looks like this (I returned on a Wednesday):

 _ **Jasmine Evans – Cabin #3 Poseidon – Counsellor – Teacher**_

 _Monday: 8:00 to 9:00 – Breakfast and Cabin Inspection (Counsellors of #3, 6, 9)_

 _9:00 to 10:00 – Sword Practise with Ares Cabin_

 _10:00 to 12:00 – Revision/Studying for Exams_

 _12:00 to 13:00 – Lunch/Break_

 _13:00 to 14:00 – Archery with Chiron and Apollo Cabin_

 _14:00 to 16:00 – Climbing wall/Running_

 _16:00 to 18:00 – Water power training with Chiron/Free Time_

 _18:00 to 19:00 – Dinner_

 _19:00 to 21:00 – Sing-a-long/Bonfire/break with every Cabin_

 _21:00 to 22:00 – Bed and lights out by 10._

 _Tuesday: 8:00 to 9:00 – Breakfast_

 _9:00 to 10:00 – Sword Practise with Ares Cabin_

 _10:00 to 12:00 – Revision/Studying for Exams_

 _12:00 to 13:00 – Lunch/Break_

 _13:00 to 14:00 – Strategy with Athena Cabin_

 _14:00 to 16:00 – Art and crafts or metal work with Hephaestus Cabin_

 _16:00 to 18:00 – Water power training/Free Time_

 _18:00 to 19:00 – Dinner_

 _19:00 to 21:00 – Sing-a-long/Bonfire/break with every Cabin_

 _21:00 to 22:00 – Bed and lights out by 10._

 _Wednesday: 8:00 to 9:00 – Breakfast and Cabin Inspection (Counsellors of #4, 7, 10)_

 _9:00 to 10:00 – Sword Practise with Ares Cabin_

 _10:00 to 12:00 – Revision/Studying for Exams_

 _12:00 to 13:00 – Lunch/Break_

 _13:00 to 14:00 – Clothing/Battle wear with Aphrodite Cabin_

 _14:00 to 16:00 – Strawberry Picking with Dionysus Cabin_

 _16:00 to 18:00 – Water power training/Free Time_

 _18:00 to 19:00 – Dinner_

 _19:00 to 21:00 – Sing-a-long/Bonfire/break with every Cabin_

 _21:00 to 22:00 – Bed and lights out by 10._

 _Thursday: 8:00 to 9:00 – Breakfast_

 _9:00 to 10:00 – Sword Practise with Ares Cabin_

 _10:00 to 12:00 – Revision/Studying for Exams_

 _12:00 to 13:00 – Lunch/Break_

 _13:00 to 14:30 – Battle Techniques with Hermes Cabin_

 _14:30 to 16:00 – Gardening with Demeter Cabin_

 _16:00 to 18:00 – Fatal Flaw training with Chiron/Free Time_

 _18:00 to 19:00 – Dinner_

 _19:00 to 21:00 – Sing-a-long/Bonfire/break with every Cabin_

 _21:00 to 22:00 – Bed and lights out by 10._

 _Friday: 8:00 to 9:00 – Breakfast and Cabin Inspection (Counsellors of #5, 11, 12)_

 _9:00 to 15:00 – Free Time, Capture the Flag Preparation_

 _15:00 to 21:00 – Capture the Flag_

 _21:00 to 22:00 – Sing-a-long/Bonfire/break with every Cabin_

 _22:00 to 23:00 – Bed and lights out by 11._

 _Saturday and Sunday are used to your leisure – we require you use it wisely._

That is usually what my schedule is like, since I am the only one in my Cabin I train with those in other Cabins, but it is good as I am friends with nearly everyone in Camp.

Cabins are as followed along with how many people there are in each: 1 – Zeus (empty); 2 – Hera (empty); 3 – Poseidon (1); 4 – Demeter (7); 5 – Ares (9); 6 – Athena (6); 7 – Apollo (12); 8 – Artemis (empty – used for the Hunters); 9 – Hephaestus (11); 10 – Aphrodite (10); 11 – Hermes and those unclaimed (21); and 12 – Dionysus (2).

Once I looked at the schedule and the list of Campers, Chiron explained what had gone on.

"…and the weather – well Zeus is angry and I am unsure of the reason why."

"He usually is angry." I shrugged.

After that remark and a goodbye I went and got myself situated into my Cabin. My Cabin is the best, although I am pretty sure I am biased. The outside is sea green with flowers going around the outside and in the wind, they look like waves. That was one of the projects I did with the Demeter Cabin one year. The roof had a dip which I enjoy laying on at night when I am able to see the stars clearly. The inside is…well 'bigger on the inside'. I watch a lot of Doctor Who, but it is quite big. Since I am the only one, I have my bed along the right wall and the other bunk beds along the left wall, in case there is the off chance that I have a sibling stay **(Foreshadowing)** but, going to my side. The walls are sea green and blue, and the wall above my headboard has a picture board, with pictures of myself and my friends and family. I have my 'study' which just means that I have my desk next to the window, a bookcase, laptop, phone, paper, books, revision etc.… I also have a vanity with basic needs. The back wall has two doors: both of which lead to ensuites i.e. one for boys on the other wall, and my ensuite which is clean and blue and has a shower, bath, sink, toilet and those of my washing needs.

Not long after I unpacked, I fell asleep in my bed.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: I got this idea when I wrote Zoe Evans, however I chose to make Jasmine a cousin of Harry and Lily and James are still alive. There is magic, however in this story, Hogwarts isn't what it is cracked up to be. All the links I use will be on my profile along with all the characters as I do not want to put it as a chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, Percy Jackson or Narnia, all the passages in books and dialogue from movies will be written in** _italics_ **so you know what it is that I definitely do not own.**

 **If you want any more information, review or PM me, but the main info that you may need is on my profile.**

 **Chapter 2 – First Week of June at Camp Half-Blood**

 **Thursday June 1** **st** **1995**

*Jasmine's POV*

Today I go back to my routine, so I went to breakfast where I caught up with my friends. They are each from different cabins and I have to admit, the only ones I do not get along with are those who are either unclaimed or of the 'lesser' gods.

Anyway I got into the regular routine of beating all of my opponents in any battle, including Capture the Flag, or CTF. I currently hold the Laurels, and I have the record of the most Laurels so far. Although it wasn't until Saturday that something most interesting happened.

 **Saturday June 3** **rd** **1995**

*Percy's POV*

 _"Go, Percy! Separate! Remember what I said."_

 _I didn't want to split up, but I had the feeling she was right-it was our only chance. I sprinted to the left, turned, and saw the creature bearing down on me. His black eyes glowed with hate. He reeked like rotten meat._

 _He lowered his head and charged, those razor-sharp horns aimed straight at my chest._

 _The fear in my stomach made me want to bolt, but that wouldn't work. I could never outrun this thing._

 _So I held my ground, and at the last moment, I jumped to the side._

 _The bull-man stormed past like a freight train, then bel-lowed with frustration and turned, but not toward me this time, toward my mother, who was setting Grover down in the grass._

 _We'd reached the crest of the hill. Down the other side I could see a valley, just as my mother had said, and the lights of a farmhouse glowing yellow through the rain. But that was half a mile away. We'd never make it._

 _The bull-man grunted, pawing the ground. He kept eyeing my mother, who was now retreating slowly downhill, back toward the road, trying to lead the monster away from Grover._

 _"Run, Percy!" she told me. "I can't go any farther. Run!"_

 _But I just stood there, frozen in fear, as the monster charged her. She tried to sidestep, as she'd told me to do, but the monster had learned his lesson. His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck as she tried to get away. He lifted her as she struggled, kicking and pummeling the air._

 _"Mom!"_

 _She caught my eyes, managed to choke out one last word: "Go!"_

 _Then, with an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around my mother's neck, and she dissolved before my eyes, melting into light, a shimmering golden form, as if she were a holographic projection. A blinding flash, and she was simply ... gone._

 _"No!"_

 _Anger replaced my fear. Newfound strength burned in my limbs-the same rush of energy I'd gotten when Mrs. Dodds grew talons._

 _The bull-man bore down on Grover, who lay helpless in the grass. The monster hunched over, snuffling my best friend, as if he were about to lift Grover up and make him dissolve too._

 _I couldn't allow that._

 _I stripped off my red rain jacket._

 _"Hey!" I screamed, waving the jacket, running to one side of the monster. "Hey, stupid! Ground beef!"_

 _"Raaaarrrrr!" The monster turned toward me, shaking his meaty fists._

 _I had an idea-a stupid idea, but better than no idea at all. I put my back to the big pine tree and waved my red jacket in front of the bull-man, thinking I'd jump out of the way at the last moment._

 _But it didn't happen like that._

 _The bull-man charged too fast, his arms out to grab me whichever way I tried to dodge._

 _Time slowed down._

 _My legs tensed. I couldn't jump sideways, so I leaped straight up, kicking off from the creature's head, using it as a springboard, turning in mid-air, and landing on his neck._

 _How did I do that? I didn't have time to figure it out. A millisecond later, the monster's head slammed into the tree and the impact nearly knocked my teeth out._

 _The bull-man staggered around, trying to shake me. I locked my arms around his horns to keep from being thrown. Thunder and lightning were still going strong. The rain was in my eyes. The smell of rotten meat burned my nostrils._

 _The monster shook himself around and bucked like a rodeo bull. He should have just backed up into the tree and smashed me flat, but I was starting to realize that this thing had only one gear: forward._

 _Meanwhile, Grover started groaning in the grass. I wanted to yell at him to shut up, but the way I was getting tossed around, if I opened my mouth I'd bite my own tongue off._

 _"Food!" Grover moaned._

 _The bull-man wheeled toward him, pawed the ground again, and got ready to charge. I thought about how he had squeezed the life out of my mother, made her disappear in a flash of light, and rage filled me like high-octane fuel. I got both hands around one horn and I pulled backward with all my might. The monster tensed, gave a surprised grunt, then-snap!_

 _The bull-man screamed and flung me through the air. I landed flat on my back in the grass. My head smacked against a rock. When I sat up, my vision was blurry, but I had a horn in my hands, a ragged bone weapon the size of a knife._

 _The monster charged._

 _Without thinking, I rolled to one side and came up kneeling. As the monster barrelled past, I drove the broken horn straight into his side, right up under his furry rib cage._

 _The bull-man roared in agony. He flailed, clawing at his chest, then began to disintegrate-not like my mother, in a flash of golden light, but like crumbling sand, blown away in chunks by the wind, the same way Mrs. Dodds had burst apart._

 _The monster was gone._

 _The rain had stopped. The storm still rumbled, but only in the distance. I smelled like livestock and my knees were shaking. My head felt like it was splitting open. I was weak and scared and trembling with grief I'd just seen my mother vanish. I wanted to lie down and cry, but there was Grover, needing my help, so I managed to haul him up and stagger down into the valley, toward the lights of the farm-house._

 _I was crying, calling for my mother, but I held on to Grover-I wasn't going to let him go._

 _The last thing I remember is collapsing on a wooden porch, looking up at a ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around a yellow light, and the stern faces of a familiar-looking bearded man, a pretty girl, her blond hair curled like a princess's_ and a girl that looked, in his state, similar to him with black hair and greenish eyes.

 _They looked down at me, and the_ blond haired _girl said, "He's the one. He must be."_

 _"Silence, Annabeth," the man said. "He's still conscious. Bring him inside."_

That was when I fainted.

*Jasmine's POV*

The boy, a beginner with monsters most definitely, had fought the Minotaur quite well for the first time, although I do feel sorry, he did just loose his mother. But I had to look at him and he looked quite similar to me in some ways which had me questioning – is he my brother?

Later that day, I joined the talk that some of my friends were having a.k.a. the cabin leaders.

"So what if he fought that monster? I bet it was just a lucky first monster." That is my best friend and one who I have known the longest; Clarisse La Rue, daughter of Ares and Cabin Leader. She isn't so bad when you have got to know her and she takes the time to notice you.

"He may be the one. The one that may be my choice to get out of here." That was Annabeth Chase; daughter of Athena and Cabin Leader. Yeah, I know what you may be thinking? A child of Poseidon and Athena friends? I am actually friends with all of Athena's children and Athena herself has taken a liking to me.

"Annabeth, we may have to watch him before we decide anything." Silena Beauregard; daughter of Aphrodite and Cabin Leader. The only decent daughter of Aphrodite there is and our mediator.

"I agree." Charles Beckendorf; son of Hephaestus, extraordinary craftsman, and Cabin Leader. He is quiet, but when he does talk he is great. He also has a crush on Silena but shush.

"For all we know, he could just be a child of another god or goddess." Katie Gardner; daughter of Demeter and Cabin Leader stated.

"Which is why we will all keep an eye on him." Lee Fletcher; son of Apollo and Cabin Leader said which was true, as there is a good chance he could be a child of any god, but we haven't had a new camper in a while so who knows.

The talk kept on going with each of the cabin leaders imputing to the conversation. Luke Castellan, son of Hermes and his younger brothers Travis and Connor; and Castor and Pollux the twin sons and co-leaders of Dionysus.

It wasn't until Monday when he woke up.

 **Monday June 5** **th** **2016**

*Percy's POV*

 _I had weird dreams full of barnyard animals. Most of them wanted to kill me. The rest wanted food._

 _I must've woken up several times, but what I heard and saw made no sense, so I just passed out again. I remember lying in a soft bed, being spoon-fed something that tasted like buttered popcorn, only it was pudding. The girl with curly blond hair hovered over me, smirking as she scraped drips off my chin with the spoon._

 _When she saw my eyes open, she asked, "What will happen at the summer solstice?"_

 _I managed to croak, "What?"_

 _She looked around, as if afraid someone would over-hear. "What's going on? What was stolen? We've only got a few weeks!"_

 _"I'm sorry," I mumbled, "I don't..." Somebody knocked on the door, and the girl quickly filled my mouth with pudding. The next time I woke up, the girl was gone._

 _A husky blond dude, like a surfer, stood in the corner of the bedroom keeping watch over me. He had blue eyes- at least a dozen of them-on his cheeks, his forehead, the backs of his hands._

The next time I woke up, the girl who looked like me had been stocking up a cupboard or something, but that was all I registered before falling back to sleep.

 _When I finally came around for good, there was nothing weird about my surroundings, except that they were nicer than I was used to. I was sitting in a deck chair on a huge porch, gazing across a meadow at green hills in the distance. The breeze smelled like strawberries. There was a blanket over my legs, a pillow behind my neck. All that was great, but my mouth felt like a scorpion had been using it for a nest. My tongue was dry and nasty and every one of my teeth hurt. On the table next to me was a tall drink. It looked like iced apple juice, with a green straw and a paper parasol stuck through a maraschino cherry. My hand was so weak I almost dropped the glass once I got my fingers around it._

 _"Careful," a familiar voice said. Grover was leaning against the porch railing, looking like he hadn't slept in a week. Under one arm, he cradled a shoe box. He was wearing blue jeans, Converse hi-tops and a bright orange T-shirt that said CAMP HALF-BLOOD. Just plain old Grover, Not the goat boy. So maybe I'd had a nightmare. Maybe my mom was okay. We were still on vacation, and we'd stopped here at this big house for some reason. And ... "You saved my life," Grover said. "I... well, the least I could do ... I went back to the hill. I thought you might want this." Reverently, he placed the shoe box in my lap. Inside was a black-and-white bull's horn, the base jagged from being broken off, the tip splattered with dried blood. It hadn't been a nightmare._

 _"The Minotaur," I said._

 _"Urn, Percy, it isn't a good idea-"_

 _"That's what they call him in the Greek myths, isn't it?" I demanded. "The Minotaur. Half man, half bull."_

 _Grover shifted uncomfortably. "You've been out for two days. How much do you remember?"_

 _"My mom. Is she really ..."_

 _He looked down. I stared across the meadow. There were groves of trees, a winding stream, acres of strawberries spread out under the blue sky. The valley was surrounded by rolling hills, and the tallest one, directly in front of us, was the one with the huge pine tree on top. Even that looked beautiful in the sunlight. My mother was gone. The whole world should be black and cold. Nothing should look beautiful._

 _"I'm sorry," Grover sniffled. "I'm a failure. I'm-I'm the worst satyr in the world." He moaned, stomping his foot so hard it came off. I mean, the Converse hi-top came off. The inside was filled with Styrofoam, except for a hoof-shaped hole. "Oh, Styx!" he mumbled. Thunder rolled across the clear sky. As he struggled to get his hoof back in the fake foot, I thought, Well, that settles it. Grover was a satyr. I was ready to bet that if I shaved his curly brown hair, I'd find tiny horns on his head. But I was too miserable to care that satyrs existed, or even minotaur's. All that meant was my mom really had been squeezed into nothingness, dissolved into yellow light. I was alone. An orphan. I would have to live with ... Smelly Gabe? No. That would never happen. I would live on the streets first. I would pretend I was seventeen and join the army. I'd do something. Grover was still sniffling. The poor kid-poor goat, satyr, whatever-looked as if he expected to be hit._

 _I said, "It wasn't your fault."_

 _"Yes, it was. I was supposed to protect you."_

 _"Did my mother ask you to protect me?"_

 _"No. But that's my job. I'm a keeper. At least... I was."_

 _"But why ..." I suddenly felt dizzy, my vision swim-ming._

 _"Don't strain yourself," Grover said. "Here." He helped me hold my glass and put the straw to my lips. I recoiled at the taste, because I was expecting apple juice. It wasn't that at all. It was chocolate-chip cookies. Liquid cookies. And not just any cookies-my mom's homemade blue chocolate-chip cookies, buttery and hot, with the chips still melting. Drinking it, my whole body felt warm and good, full of energy. My grief didn't go away, but I felt as if my mom had just brushed her hand against my cheek, given me a cookie the way she used to when I was small, and told me everything was going to be okay. Before I knew it, I'd drained the glass. I stared into it, sure I'd just had a warm drink, but the ice cubes hadn't even melted._

 _"Was it good?" Grover asked. I nodded. "What did it taste like?" He sounded so wistful, I felt guilty._

 _"Sorry," I said. "I should've let you taste."_

"That may not be such a good idea." The green eyed girl said from her position leaning against the doorframe. I was shocked, I had just realised she was there.

 _His eyes got wide. "No! That's not what I meant. I just... wondered."_

 _"Chocolate-chip cookies," I said. "My mom's. Home-made."_

 _He sighed. "And how do you feel?" "Like I could throw Nancy Bobofit a hundred yards."_

 _"That's good," he said. "That's good. I don't think you could risk drinking any more of that stuff"_

 _"What do you mean?" He took the empty glass from me gingerly, as if it were dynamite, and set it back on the table._

The girl decided to give an answer. "It may be effective, but too much can lead to devastating consequence." She paused before saying "I am Jasmine by the way. Jasmine Evans, daughter of Poseidon."

That would explain the sea green eyes. "I am Percy Jackson, and I am the son of Sally Jackson."

"You don't know your father?" She questioned softly.

"No, he left when I was born."

She nodded her head thoughtfully.

 _"Come on. Chiron and Mr. D are waiting."_ Grover put in.

 _The porch wrapped all the way around the farmhouse. My legs felt wobbly, trying to walk that far. Grover offered to carry the Minotaur horn, but I held on to it. I'd paid for that souvenir the hard way. I wasn't going to let it go. As we came around the opposite end of the house, I caught my breath. We must've been on the north shore of Long Island, because on this side of the house, the valley marched all the way up to the water, which glittered about a mile in the distance. Between here and there, I simply couldn't process everything I was seeing. The landscape was dotted with buildings that looked like ancient Greek architecture-an open-air pavilion, an amphitheatre, a circular arena-except that they all looked brand new, their white marble columns sparkling in the sun. In a nearby sandpit, a dozen high school-age kids and satyrs played volleyball. Canoes glided across a small lake. Kids in bright orange T-shirts like Grover's were chasing each other around a cluster of cabins nestled in the woods. Some shot targets at an archery range. Others rode horses down a wooded trail, and, unless I was hallucinating, some of their horses had wings._

 _Down at the end of the porch, two men sat across from each other at a card table._

 _The blond-haired girl who'd spoon-fed me popcorn-flavoured pudding was leaning on the porch rail next to them._

 _The man facing me was small, but porky. He had a red nose, big watery eyes, and curly hair so black it was almost purple. He looked like those paintings of baby angels- what do you call them, hubbubs? No, cherubs. That's it. He looked like a cherub who'd turned middle-aged in a trailer park. He wore a tiger pattern Hawaiian shirt, and he would've fit right in at one of Gabe's poker parties, except I got the feeling this guy could've out-gambled even my step-father._

 _"That's Mr. D,"_ Jasmine _murmured to me._

 _"He's the camp director. Be polite. The girl, that's Annabeth Chase. She's just a camper, but she's been here longer than just about anybody_ apart from Jasmine here." Grover gestured to his right. _"And you already know Chiron..." He pointed at the guy whose back was to me._

 _First, I realized he was sitting in the wheelchair. Then I recognized the tweed jacket, the thinning brown hair, the scraggly beard._

 _"Mr. Brunner!" I cried. The Latin teacher turned and smiled at me. His eyes had that mischievous glint they sometimes got in class when he pulled a pop quiz and made all the multiple choice answers B._

 _"Ah, good, Percy,_ Grover, Jasmine" _he said. "Now we have_ five _for pinochle."_

*Jasmine's POV*

I tuned out for most of the conversation however I did pick up a few of the key facts about the new guy – Percy Jackson. I tuned in fully when Mr D took Grover someplace.

 _"Old Dionysus isn't really mad. He just hates his job. He's been ... ah, grounded, I guess you would say, and he can't stand waiting another century before he's allowed to go back to Olympus."_ Chiron said to Percy.

 _"Mount Olympus,"_ he said. _"You're telling me there really is a palace there?"_

"There's one on Mars." I 'helpfully' put in.

 _"Well now, there's Mount Olympus in Greece. And then there's the home of the gods, the convergence point of their powers, which did indeed used to be on Mount Olympus. It's still called Mount Olympus, out of respect to the old ways, but the palace moves, Percy, just as the gods do."_

 _"You mean the Greek gods are here? Like ... in America?"_

"No he means Timbuktu." I said sarcastically.

 _"Well, certainly. The gods move with the heart of the West."_

 _"The what?"_

 _"Come now, Percy. What you call 'Western civilization.' Do you think it's just an abstract concept? No, it's a living force. A collective consciousness that has burned bright for thousands of years. The gods are part of it. You might even say they are the source of it, or at least, they are tied so tightly to it that they couldn't possibly fade, not unless all of Western civilization were obliterated. The fire started in Greece. Then, as you well know-or as I hope you know, since you passed my course-the heart of the fire moved to Rome, and so did the gods. Oh, different names, perhaps - Jupiter for Zeus, Venus for Aphrodite, and so on-but the same forces, the same gods."_

 _"And then they died."_

 _"Died? No. Did the West die? The gods simply moved, to Germany, to France, to Spain, for a while. Wherever the flame was brightest, the gods were there. They spent several centuries in England. All you need to do is look at the architecture. People do not forget the gods. Every place they've ruled, for the last three thousand years, you can see them in paintings, in statues, on the most important buildings. And yes, Percy, of course they are now in your United States. Look at your symbol, the eagle of Zeus. Look at the statue of Prometheus in Rockefeller Centre, the Greek facades of your government buildings in Washington. I defy you to find any American city where the Olympians are not prominently displayed in multiple places. Like it or not-and believe me, plenty of people weren't very fond of Rome, either America is now the heart of the flame. It is the great power of the West. And so Olympus is here. And we are here."_

I could tell Percy, who I deducted was just a bit younger, and very ignorant, than myself.

 _"Who are you, Chiron? Who ... who am I?"_

Chiron smiled. Ah the new boy didn't grasp who Chiron actually was, did he? This would be interesting, I grinned at Chiron. _"Who are you?"_ he mused. " _Well, that's the question we all want answered, isn't it? But for now, we should get you a bunk in cabin eleven. There will be new friends to meet. And plenty of time for lessons tomorrow. Besides, there will be smores at the campfire tonight, and I simply adore chocolate."_ He stood up and I could see the shock on Percy's face. _"What a relief,"_ the centaur said _. "I'd been cooped up in there so long, my fetlocks had fallen asleep. Now, come, Percy Jackson. Let's meet the other campers."_


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: I got this idea when I wrote Zoe Evans, however I chose to make Jasmine a cousin of Harry and Lily and James are still alive. There is magic, however in this story, Hogwarts isn't what it is cracked up to be. All the links I use will be on my profile along with all the characters as I do not want to put it as a chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, Percy Jackson or Narnia, all the passages in books and dialogue from movies will be written in** _italics_ **so you know what it is that I definitely do not own.**

 **If you want any more information, review or PM me, but the main info that you may need is on my profile.**

 **Chapter 3 – The Days Before Capture the Flag**

 **Monday June 5** **th** **1995**

*Percy's POV*

 _Once I got over the fact that my Latin teacher was a horse, we had a nice tour, though I was careful not to walk behind him. I'd done pooper-scooper patrol in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade a few times, and, I'm sorry, I did not trust Chiron's back end the way I trusted his front. We passed the volleyball pit. Several of the campers nudged each other. One pointed to the minotaur horn I was carrying. Another said, "That's him." Most of the campers were older than me. Their satyr friends were bigger than Grover, all of them trotting around in orange CAMP HALF-BLOOD T-shirts, with nothing else to cover their bare shaggy hindquarters. I wasn't normally shy, but the way they stared at me made me uncomfortable. I felt like they were expecting me to do a flip or something. 80 | Page I looked back at the farmhouse. It was a lot bigger than I'd realized-four stories tall, sky blue with white trim, like an upscale seaside resort. I was checking out the brass eagle weather vane on top when something caught my eye, a shadow in the uppermost window of the attic gable. Something had moved the curtain, just for a second, and I got the distinct impression I was being watched._

 _"What's up there?" I asked Chiron._

 _He looked where I was pointing, and his smile faded. "Just the attic."_

 _"Somebody lives there?"_

 _"No," he said with finality. "Not a single living thing."_

 _I got the feeling he was being truthful. But I was also sure something had moved that curtain. "Come along, Percy," Chiron said, his lighthearted tone now a little forced. "Lots to see."_

 _We walked through the strawberry fields, where campers were picking bushels of berries while a satyr played a tune on a reed pipe. Chiron told me the camp grew a nice crop for export to New York restaurants and Mount Olympus. "It pays our expenses," he explained. "And the strawberries take almost no effort." He said Mr. D had this effect on fruit-bearing plants: they just went crazy when he was around. It worked best with wine grapes, but Mr. D was restricted from growing those, so they grew strawberries instead. I watched the satyr playing his pipe. His music was causing lines of bugs to leave the strawberry patch in every direction, like refugees fleeing a fire. I wondered if Grover could work that kind of magic with music. I wondered if he was still inside the farmhouse, getting chewed out by Mr. D._

 _"Grover won't get in too much trouble, will he?" I asked Chiron. "I mean ... he was a good protector. Really."_

 _Chiron sighed. He shed his tweed jacket and draped it over his horses back like a saddle. "Grover has big dreams, Percy. Perhaps bigger than are reasonable. To reach his goal, he must first demonstrate great courage by succeeding as a keeper, finding a new camper and bringing him safely to Half-Blood Hill."_

 _"But he did that!"_

 _"I might agree with you," Chiron said. "But it is not my place to judge. Dionysus and the Council of Cloven Elders must decide. I'm afraid they might not see this assignment as a success. After all, Grover lost you in New York. Then there's the unfortunate ... ah ... fate of your mother. And the fact that Grover was unconscious when you dragged him over the property line. The council might question whether this shows any courage on Grover's part." I wanted to protest. None of what happened was Grover's fault. I also felt really, really guilty. If I hadn't given Grover the slip at the bus station, he might not have gotten in trouble._

 _"He'll get a second chance, won't he?"_

 _Chiron winced. "I'm afraid that was Grover's second chance, Percy. The council was not anxious to give him another, either, after what happened the first time, five years ago. Olympus knows, I advised him to wait longer before trying again. He's still so small for his age..."_

 _"How old is he?"_

 _"Oh, twenty-eight."_

 _"What! And he's in sixth grade?"_

 _"Satyrs mature half as fast as humans, Percy. Grover has been the equivalent of a middle school student for the past six years."_

 _"That's horrible."_

 _"Quite," Chiron agreed. "At any rate, Grover is a late bloomer, even by satyr standards, and not yet very accomplished at woodland magic. Alas, he was anxious to pursue his dream. Perhaps now he will find some other career..."_

 _"That's not fair," I said. "What happened the first time? Was it really so bad?"_

 _Chiron looked away quickly. "Let's move along, shall we?" But I wasn't quite ready to let the subject drop. Something had occurred to me when Chiron talked about my mother's fate, as if he were intentionally avoiding the word death. The beginnings of an idea-a tiny, hopeful fire-started forming in my mind._

 _"Chiron," I said. "If the gods and Olympus and all that are real ..."_

 _"Yes, child?"_

 _"Does that mean the Underworld is real, too?"_

 _Chiron's expression darkened. "Yes, child." He paused, as if choosing his words care-fully. "There is a place where spirits go after death. But for now ... until we know more ... I would urge you to put that out of your mind."_

 _"What do you mean, 'until we know more'?"_

 _"Come, Percy. Let's see the woods." As we got closer, I realized how huge the forest was. It took up at least a quarter of the valley, with trees so tall and thick, you could imagine nobody had been in there since the Native Americans. Chiron said, "The woods are stocked, if you care to try your luck, but go armed."_

 _"Stocked with what?" I asked. "Armed with what?"_

 _"You'll see. Capture the flag is Friday night. Do you have your own sword and shield?"_

 _"My own-?"_

 _"No," Chiron said. "I don't suppose you do. I think a size five will do. I'll visit the armory later."_

 _I wanted to ask what kind of summer camp had an armory, but there was too much else to think about, so the tour continued. We saw the archery range, the canoeing lake, the stables (which Chiron didn't seem to like very much), the javelin range, the sing-along amphitheater, and the arena where Chiron said they held sword and spear fights. "Sword and spear fights?" I asked._

 _"Cabin challenges and all that," he explained. "Not lethal. Usually. Oh, yes, and there's the mess hall." Chiron pointed to an outdoor pavilion framed in white Grecian columns on a hill overlooking the sea. There were a dozen stone picnic tables. No roof. No walls._

 _"What do you do when it rains?" I asked._

 _Chiron looked at me as if I'd gone a little weird. "We still have to eat, don't we?" I decided to drop the subject._

 _Finally, he showed me the cabins. There were twelve of them, nestled in the woods by the lake. They were arranged in a U, with two at the base and five in a row on either side. And they were without doubt the most bizarre collection of buildings I'd ever seen. Except for the fact that each had a large brass number above the door (odds on the left side, evens on the right), they looked absolutely nothing alike. Number nine had smokestacks, like a tiny factory. Number four had tomato vines on the walls and a roof made out of real grass. Seven seemed to be made of solid gold, which gleamed so much in the sunlight it was almost impossible to look at. They all faced a commons area about the size of a soccer field, dot-ted with Greek statues, fountains, flower beds, and a couple of basketball hoops (which were more my speed). In the center of the field was a huge stone-lined firepit. Even though it was a warm afternoon, the hearth smol-dered. A girl about nine years old was tending the flames, poking the coals with a stick. The pair of cabins at the head of the field, numbers one and two, looked like his-and-hers mausoleums, big white marble boxes with heavy columns in front. Cabin one was the biggest and bulkiest of the twelve. Its polished bronze doors shimmered like a hologram, so that from different angles lightning bolts seemed to streak across them. Cabin two was more graceful somehow, with slimmer columns garlanded with pomegranates and flowers. The walls were carved with images of peacocks._

 _"Zeus and Hera?" I guessed._

 _"Correct," Chiron said._

 _"Their cabins look empty."_

 _"Several of the cabins are. That's true. No one ever stays in one or two."_ _Okay. So each cabin had a different god, like a mascot. Twelve cabins for the twelve Olympians. But why would some be empty? I stopped in front of the first cabin on the left, cabin three. It wasn't high and mighty like cabin one, but long and low and solid. The outer walls were of rough gray stone studded with pieces of seashell and coral, as if the slabs had been hewn straight from the bottom of the ocean floor._

 _I peeked inside the open doorway and Chiron said, "Oh, I wouldn't do that!" Before he could pull me back, I caught the salty scent of the interior, like the wind on the shore at Montauk. The interior walls glowed like abalone. There were six empty bunk beds with silk sheets turned down._ On one side of this, was the only sign of someone living there. _The place felt so sad and lonely, I was glad when Chiron put his hand on my shoulder and said, "Jasmine's a daughter of Poseidon. Come along, Percy." Most of the other cabins were crowded with campers. Number five was bright red-a real nasty paint job, as if the color had been splashed on with buckets and fists. The roof was lined with barbed wire. A stuffed wild boar's head hung over the doorway, and its eyes seemed to follow me. Inside I could see a bunch of mean-looking kids, both girls and boys, arm wrestling and arguing with each other while rock music blared. The loudest was a girl maybe thirteen or fourteen. She wore a size XXXL CAMP HALF-BLOOD T-shirt under a camouflage jacket. She zeroed in on me and gave me an evil sneer. She reminded me of Nancy Bobofit, though the camper girl was much bigger and tougher looking, and her hair was long and stringy, and brown instead of red. I kept walking, trying to stay clear of Chiron's hooves._

 _"We haven't seen any other centaurs," I observed._

 _"No," said Chiron sadly. "My kinsmen are a wild and barbaric folk, I'm afraid. You might encounter them in the wilderness, or at major sporting events. But you won't see any here."_

 _"You said your name was Chiron. Are you really ..."_

 _He smiled down at me. "The Chiron from the stories? Trainer of Hercules and all that? Yes, Percy, I am."_

 _"But, shouldn't you be dead?"_

 _Chiron paused, as if the question intrigued him. "I honestly don't know about should be. The truth is, I can't be dead. You see, eons ago the gods granted my wish. I could continue the work I loved. I could be a teacher of heroes as long as humanity needed me. I gained much from that wish...and I gave up much. But I'm still here, so I can only assume I'm still needed."_

 _I thought about being a teacher for three thousand years. It wouldn't have made my Top Ten Things to Wish for list. "Doesn't it ever get boring?"_

 _"No, no," he said. "Horribly depressing, at times, but never boring."_

 _"Why depressing?"_

 _Chiron seemed to turn hard of hearing again. "Oh, look," he said. "Annabeth is waiting for us."_

 _The blond girl I'd met at the Big House was reading a book in front of the last cabin on the left, number eleven. When we reached her, she looked me over critically, like she was still thinking about how much I drooled. I tried to see what she was reading, but I couldn't make out the title. I thought my dyslexia was acting up. Then I realized the title wasn't even English. The letters looked Greek to me. I mean, literally Greek. There were pictures of temples and statues and different kinds of columns, like those in an architecture book._

 _"Annabeth," Chiron said, "I have masters' archery class at noon. Would you take Percy from here_? If you need any help either request for Luke or Jasmine."

 _"Yes, sir."_

 _"Cabin eleven," Chiron told me, gesturing toward the doorway. "Make yourself at home."_

 _Out of all the cabins, eleven looked the most like a regular old summer camp cabin, with the emphasis on old. The threshold was worn down, the brown paint peeling. Over the doorway was one of those doctor's symbols, a winged pole with two snakes wrapped around it. What did they call it...? A caduceus. Inside, it was packed with people, both boys and girls, way more than the number of bunk beds. Sleeping bags were spread all over on the floor. It looked like a gym where the Red Cross had set up an evacuation centre. Chiron didn't go in. The door was too low for him. But when the campers saw him they all stood and bowed respectfully._

 _"Well, then," Chiron said. "Good luck, Percy. I'll see you at dinner." He galloped away toward the archery range._

 _I stood in the doorway, looking at the kids. They weren't bowing anymore. They were staring at me, sizing me up. I knew this routine. I'd gone through it at enough schools._

 _"Well?" Annabeth prompted. "Go on."_

 _So naturally I tripped coming in the door and made a total fool of myself. There were some snickers from the campers, but none of them said anything._

 _Annabeth announced, "Percy Jackson, meet cabin eleven."_

 _"Regular or undetermined?" somebody asked._

 _I didn't know what to say, but Annabeth said, "Undetermined."_

 _Everybody groaned. A guy who was a little older than the rest came forward._

 _"Now, now, campers. That's what we're here for. Welcome, Percy. You can have that spot on the floor, right over there." The guy was about nineteen, and he looked pretty cool. He was tall and muscular, with short-cropped sandy hair and a friendly smile. He wore an orange tank top, cut-offs, sandals, and a leather necklace with five different-coloured clay beads. The only thing unsettling about his appearance was a thick white scar that ran from just beneath his right eye to his jaw, like an old knife slash._

 _"This is Luke," Annabeth said, and her voice sounded different somehow. I glanced over and could've sworn she was blushing. She saw me looking, and her expression hardened again. "He's your counsellor for now."_

 _"For now?" I asked._

 _"You're undetermined," Luke explained patiently. "They don't know what cabin to put you in, so you're here. Cabin eleven takes all newcomers, all visitors. Naturally, we would. Hermes, our patron, is the god of travellers."_

 _I looked at the tiny section of floor they'd given me. I had nothing to put there to mark it as my own, no luggage, no clothes, no sleeping bag. Just the Minotaur's horn. I thought about setting that down, but then I remembered that Hermes was also the god of thieves. I looked around at the campers' faces, some sullen and suspicious, some grinning stupidly, some eyeing me as if they were waiting for a chance to pick my pockets._

 _"How long will I be here?" I asked._

 _"Good question," Luke said. "Until you're determined."_

 _"How long will that take?" The campers all laughed._

 _"Come on," Annabeth told me. "I'll show you the volleyball court."_

 _"I've already seen it."_

 _"Come on." She grabbed my wrist and dragged me outside. I could hear the kids of cabin eleven laughing behind me._

 _When we were a few feet away, Annabeth said, "Jackson, you have to do better than that."_

 _"What?"_

 _She rolled her eyes and mumbled under her breath, "I can't believe I thought you were the one."_

 _"What's your problem?" I was getting angry now. "All I know is, I kill some bull guy-"_

 _"Don't talk like that!" Annabeth told me. "You know how many kids at this camp wish they'd had your chance?"_

 _"To get killed?"_

 _"To fight the Minotaur! What do you think we train for?"_

 _I shook my head. "Look, if the thing I fought really was the Minotaur, the same one in the stories ..."_

 _"Yes."_

 _"Then there's only one."_

 _"Yes."_

 _"And he died, like, a gajillion years ago, right? Theseus killed him in the labyrinth. So ..."_

 _"Monsters don't die, Percy. They can be killed. But they don't die."_

 _"Oh, thanks. That clears it up."_

 _"They don't have souls, like you and me. You can dispel them for a while, maybe even for a whole lifetime if you're lucky. But they are primal forces. Chiron calls them archetypes. Eventually, they reform."_

 _I thought about Mrs. Dodds. "You mean if I killed one, accidentally, with a sword-"_

 _"The Fur ... I mean, your math teacher. That's right. She's still out there. You just made her very, very mad."_

 _"How did you know about Mrs. Dodds?"_

 _"You talk in your sleep."_

 _"You almost called her something. A Fury? They're Hades' torturers, right?"_

 _Annabeth glanced nervously at the ground, as if she expected it to open up and swallow her. "You shouldn't call them by name, even here. We call them the Kindly Ones, if we have to speak of them at all."_

 _"Look, is there anything we can say without it thundering?" I sounded whiny, even to myself, but right then I didn't care. "Why do I have to stay in cabin eleven, anyway? Why is everybody so crowded together? There are plenty of empty bunks right over there." I pointed to the first few cabins, and Annabeth turned pale._

 _"You don't just choose a cabin, Percy. It depends on who your parents are. Or ... your parent." She stared at me, waiting for me to get it._

 _"My mom is Sally Jackson," I said. "She works at the candy store in Grand Central Station. At least, she used to."_

 _"I'm sorry about your mom, Percy. But that's not what I mean. I'm talking about your other parent. Your dad."_

 _"He's dead. I never knew him."_

 _Annabeth sighed. Clearly, she'd had this conversation before with other kids. "Your father's not dead, Percy."_

 _"How can you say that? You know him?"_

 _"No, of course not."_

 _"Then how can you say-"_

 _"Because I know you. You wouldn't be here if you weren't one of us."_

 _"You don't know anything about me."_

 _"No?" She raised an eyebrow. "I bet you moved around from school to school. I bet you were kicked out of a lot of them."_

 _"How-"_

 _"Diagnosed with dyslexia. Probably ADHD, too."_

 _I tried to swallow my embarrassment. "What does that have to do with anything?"_

 _"Taken together, it's almost a sure sign. The letters float off the page when you read, right? That's because your mind is hardwired for ancient Greek. And the ADHD-you're impulsive, can't sit still in the classroom. That's your battle-field reflexes. In a real fight, they'd keep you alive. As for the attention problems, that's because you see too much, Percy, not too little. Your senses are better than a regular mortal's. Of course the teachers want you medicated. Most of them are monsters. They don't want you seeing them for what they are."_

 _"You sound like ... you went through the same thing?"_

 _"Most of the kids here did. If you weren't like us, you couldn't have survived the Minotaur, much less the ambrosia and nectar."_

 _"Ambrosia and nectar."_

 _"The food and drink we were giving you to make you better. That stuff would've killed a normal kid. It would've turned your blood to fire and your bones to sand and you'd be dead. Face it. You're a half blood." A half-blood. I was reeling with so many questions I didn't know where to start._

 _Then a husky voice yelled, "Well! A newbie!"_

 _I looked over. The big girl from the ugly red cabin was sauntering toward us. She had three other girls behind her, all big and ugly and mean looking like her, all wearing camo jackets._

 _"Clarisse," Annabeth sighed. "Why don't you go polish your spear or something?"_

 _"Sure, Miss_ Smarty _," the big girl said. "So I can run you through with it Friday night."_

 _''Erre es korakas!" Annabeth said, which I somehow under-stood was Greek for 'Go to the crows!' though I had a feeling it was a worse curse than it sounded. "You don't stand a chance."_

 _"We'll pulverize you," Clarisse said, but her eye twitched. Perhaps she wasn't sure she could follow through on the threat._ "well, we have got the Princess on our team." _She turned toward me. "Who's this little runt?"_

 _"Percy Jackson," Annabeth said, "meet Clarisse, Daughter of Ares."_

 _I blinked. "Like ... the war god?"_

 _Clarisse sneered. "You got a problem with that?"_

 _"No," I said, recovering my wits. "It explains the bad smell."_

 _Clarisse growled. "We got an initiation ceremony for newbies, Prissy."_

 _"Percy."_

 _"Whatever. Come on, I'll show you."_

 _"Clarisse-" Annabeth tried to say._

 _"Stay out of it, wise girl."_

 _Annabeth looked pained, but she did stay out of it, and I didn't really want her help. I was the new kid. I had to earn my own rep. I handed Annabeth my minotaur horn and got ready to fight, but before I knew it, Clarisse had me by the neck and was dragging me toward a cinder-block building that I knew immediately was the bathroom. I was kicking and punching. I'd been in plenty of fights before, but this big girl Clarisse had hands like iron. She dragged me into the girls' bathroom. There was a line of toilets on one side and a line of shower stalls down the other. It smelled just like any public bathroom, and I was thinking-as much as I could think with Clarisse ripping my hair out-that if this place belonged to the gods, they should've been able to afford classier johns._

 _Clarisse's friends were all laughing, and I was trying to find the strength I'd used to fight the Minotaur, but it just wasn't there._

 _"Like he's 'Big Three' material," Clarisse said as she pushed me toward one of the toilets. "Yeah, right, the Minotaur probably fell over laughing, he was so stupid looking."_

 _Her friends snickered._

 _Annabeth stood in the corner, watching through her fingers. Clarisse bent me over on my knees and started pushing my head toward the toilet bowl. It reeked like rusted pipes and, well, like what goes into toilets. I strained to keep my head up. I was looking at the scummy water, thinking, I will not go into that. I won't. Then something happened. I felt a tug in the pit of my stomach. I heard the plumbing rumble, the pipes shudder. Clarisse's grip on my hair loosened. Water shot out of the toilet, making an arc straight over my head, and the next thing I knew, I was sprawled on the bathroom tiles with Clarisse screaming behind me. I turned just as water blasted out of the toilet again, hit-ting Clarisse straight in the face so hard it pushed her down onto her butt. The water stayed on her like the spray from a fire hose, pushing her backward into a shower stall. She struggled, gasping, and her friends started coming toward her. But then the other toilets exploded, too, and six more streams of toilet water blasted them back. The showers acted up, too, and together all the fixtures sprayed the camouflage girls right out of the bathroom, spinning them around like pieces of garbage being washed away. As soon as they were out the door, I felt the tug in my gut lessen, and the water shut off as quickly as it had started._

 _The entire bathroom was flooded. Annabeth hadn't been spared. She was dripping wet, but she hadn't been pushed out the door. She was standing in exactly the same place, staring at me in shock. I looked down and realized I was sitting in the only dry spot in the whole room. There was a circle of dry floor around me. I didn't have one drop of water on my clothes. Nothing. I stood up, my legs shaky._

 _Annabeth said, "How did you ..."_

 _"I don't know."_

 _We walked to the door. Outside, Clarisse and her friends were sprawled in the mud, and a bunch of other campers had gathered around to gawk. Clarisse's hair was flattened across her face. Her camouflage jacket was sopping and she smelled like sewage. She gave me a look of absolute hatred._

 _"You are dead, new boy. You are totally dead."_

 _I probably should have let it go, but I said, "You want to gargle with toilet water again, Clarisse? Close your mouth."_

 _Her friends had to hold her back. They dragged her toward cabin five, while the other campers made way to avoid her flailing feet._

 _Annabeth stared at me. I couldn't tell whether she was just grossed out or angry at me for dousing her._

 _"What?" I demanded. "What are you thinking?"_

 _"I'm thinking," she said, "that I want you on my team for capture the flag."_

*Jasmine's POV*

I ditched them as they went to Cabin 11, since I got bored of them talking and so headed off towards the lake, since it was free time and Chiron was occupied to even think of our lessons. I spent the next few hours getting my stamina up when I heard about the toilet incident. I haven't laughed as hard as I did then. Tomorrow training with Clarisse will be fun.

It wasn't long before I headed off to dinner where I would expect that Percy would be introduced.

What do you know? I was right.

We all sat at our normal tables and I was alone as usual, but that was fine during meals as it is rude to talk while eating, naturally all our meals as a family are quiet, barring the special ones.

 _Finally, Chiron pounded his hoof against the marble floor of the pavilion, and everybody fell silent. He raised a glass. "To the gods!"_

 _Everybody else raised their glasses. "To the gods!"_

When I put my glass down I asked for my usual: 'vegetable paella, chocolate fudge brownie cake, cherry coke'.

I also had a bit of extra which I used to sacrifice to the gods. 'Poseidon, Hestia, Zeus, Hades, Apollo, Artemis…' I sacrifice to all of the known Greek gods, and I am the only one to do so.

 _When everybody had returned to their seats and finished eating their meals, Chiron pounded his hoof again for our attention._

 _Mr. D got up with a huge sigh. "Yes, I suppose I'd better say hello to all you brats. Well, hello. Our activities director, Chiron, says the next capture the flag is Friday. Cabin_ three _presently holds the laurels."_

I smirked at that. I always win.

 _"Personally," Mr. D continued, "I couldn't care less, but congratulations. Also, I should tell you that we have a new camper today. Peter Johnson."_

 _Chiron murmured something. "Er, Percy Jackson," Mr. D corrected. "That's right. Hurrah, and all that. Now run along to your silly campfire. Go on."_

 _Everybody cheered. We all headed down toward the amphitheatre, where Apollo's cabin led a singalong. We sang camp songs about the gods and ate smores and joked around._

It wasn't long before we all went to bed and everything was going well.

Oh I didn't know how wrong that was.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: I got this idea when I wrote Zoe Evans, however I chose to make Jasmine a cousin of Harry and Lily and James are still alive. There is magic, however in this story, Hogwarts isn't what it is cracked up to be. All the links I use will be on my profile along with all the characters as I do not want to put it as a chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, Percy Jackson or Narnia, all the passages in books and dialogue from movies will be written in** _italics_ **so you know what it is that I definitely do not own.**

 **If you want any more information, review or PM me, but the main info that you may need is on my profile.**

 **Chapter 4 – We Capture a Flag and a Brother**

 **Friday June 9** **th** **1995**

*Percy's POV*

 _Friday afternoon, I was sitting with Grover at the lake, resting from a near-death experience on the climbing wall. Grover had scampered to the top like a mountain goat, but the lava had almost gotten me. My shirt had smoking holes in it. The hairs had been singed off my forearms. We sat on the pier, watching the naiads do underwater basket-weaving, until I got up the nerve to ask Grover how his conversation had gone with Mr. D. His face turned a sickly shade of yellow._

 _"Fine," he said. "Just great."_

 _"So your career's still on track?" He glanced at me nervously._

 _"Chiron t-told you I want a searcher's license?"_

 _"Well... no." I had no idea what a searcher's license was, but it didn't seem like the right time to ask. "He just said you had big plans, you know ... and that you needed credit for completing a keeper's assignment. So did you get it?"_

 _Grover looked down at the naiads. "Mr. D suspended judgment. He said I hadn't failed or succeeded with you yet, so our fates were still tied together. If you got a quest and I went along to protect you, and we both came back alive, then maybe he'd consider the job complete."_

 _My spirits lifted. "Well, that's not so bad, right?"_

 _"Blaa-ha-ha! He might as well have transferred me to stable-cleaning duty. The chances of you getting a quest... and even if you did, why would you want me along?"_

 _"Of course I'd want you along!"_

 _Grover stared glumly into the water. "Basket-weaving ... Must be nice to have a useful skill."_

 _I tried to reassure him that he had lots of talents, but that just made him look more miserable. We talked about canoeing and swordplay for a while, then debated the pros and cons of the different gods. Finally, I asked him about the four empty cabins._

 _"Number eight, the silver one, belongs to Artemis," he said. "She vowed to be a maiden forever. So of course, no kids. The cabin is, you know, honorary. If she didn't have one, she'd be mad."_

 _"Yeah, okay. But the other three, the ones at the end. Are those the Big Three?"_

 _Grover tensed. We were getting close to a touchy subject. "No. One of them, number two, is Hera's," he said. "That's another honorary thing. She's the goddess of marriage, so of course she wouldn't go around having affairs with mortals. That's her husband's job. When we say the Big Three, we mean the three powerful brothers, the sons of Kronos."_

 _"Zeus, Poseidon, Hades."_

 _"Right. You know. After the great battle with the Titans, they took over the world from their dad and drew lots to decide who got what."_

 _"Zeus got the sky," I remembered. "Poseidon the sea, Hades the Underworld."_

 _"Uh-huh."_

 _"But Hades doesn't have a cabin here."_

 _"No. He doesn't have a throne on Olympus, either. He sort of does his own thing down in the Underworld. If he did have a cabin here ..." Grover shuddered. "Well, it wouldn't be pleasant. Let's leave it at that."_

 _"But Zeus and Poseidon-they both had, like, a bazillion kids in the myths. Why are their cabins empty?_ Or at least almost empty?"

 _Grover shifted his hooves uncomfortably. "About sixty years ago, after World War II, the Big Three agreed they wouldn't sire any more heroes. Their children were just too powerful. They were affecting the course of human events too much, causing too much carnage. World War II, you know, that was basically a fight between the sons of Zeus and Poseidon on one side, and the sons of Hades on the other. The winning side, Zeus and Poseidon, made Hades swear an oath with them: no more affairs with mortal women. They all swore on the River Styx." Thunder boomed._

 _I said, "That's the most serious oath you can make."_

 _Grover nodded._

 _"And the brothers kept their word-no kids?"_

 _Grover's face darkened._ "Thirteen years ago, Poseidon had a daughter, Jasmine Evans as you may have met, she is special since she is the first mortal daughter of Poseidon, most loved demigod of the gods and her mother was a demigod so she is more of a trigod or something, especially with the magic in her body. _Seventeen years ago, Zeus fell off the wagon. There was this TV starlet with a big fluffy eighties hairdo-he just couldn't help himself. When their child was born, a little girl named Thalia...well, the River Styx is serious about promises. Zeus himself got off easy because he's immortal, but he brought a terrible fate on his daughter."_

 _"But that isn't fair. It wasn't the little girl's fault."_

 _Grover hesitated. "Percy, children of the Big Three have powers greater than other half-bloods. They have a strong aura, a scent that attracts monsters. When Hades found out about the girl_ s, _he wasn't too happy about Zeus_ or Poseidon _breaking_ their _oath_. Jasmine was lucky, however, since Hades was amongst the gods and goddesses who favoured her. _Hades let the worst monsters out of Tartarus to torment Thalia. A satyr was assigned to be her keeper when she was twelve, but there was nothing he could do. He tried to escort her here with a couple of other half-bloods she'd befriended. They almost made it. They got all the way to the top of that hill." He pointed across the valley, to the pine tree where I'd fought the minotaur. "All three Kindly Ones were after them, along with a horde of hellhounds. They were about to be overrun when Thalia told her satyr to take the other two half-bloods to safety while she held off the monsters. She was wounded and tired, and she didn't want to live like a hunted animal. The satyr didn't want to leave her, but he couldn't change her mind, and he had to protect the others. So Thalia made her final stand alone, at the top of that hill. As she died, Zeus took pity on her. He turned her into that pine tree. Her spirit still helps protect the borders of the valley. That's why the hill is called Half-Blood Hill."_

 _I stared at the pine in the distance. The story made me feel hollow, and guilty too. A girl my age had sacrificed herself to save her friends. She had faced a whole army of monsters. Next to that, my victory over the Minotaur didn't seem like much. I wondered, if I'd acted differently, could I have saved my mother? "Grover," I said, "have heroes really gone on quests to the Underworld?"_

 _"Sometimes," he said. "Orpheus. Hercules. Houdini."_

 _"And have they ever returned somebody from the dead?"_

 _"No. Never. Orpheus came close... Percy, you're not seriously thinking-"_

 _"No," I lied. "I was just wondering. So ... a satyr is always assigned to guard a demigod?"_

 _Grover studied me warily. I hadn't persuaded him that I'd really dropped the Underworld idea. "Not always. We go undercover to a lot of schools. We try to sniff out the half-bloods who have the makings of great heroes. If we find one with a very strong aura, like a child of the Big Three, we alert Chiron. He tries to keep an eye on them, since they could cause really huge problems."_

 _"And you found me. Chiron said you thought I might be something special."_

 _Grover looked as if I'd just led him into a trap. "I didn't... Oh, listen, don't think like that. If you were-you know-you'd never ever be allowed a quest, and I'd never get my license. You're probably a child of Hermes. Or maybe even one of the minor gods, like Nemesis, the god of revenge. Don't worry, okay?" I got the idea he was reassuring himself more than me._

 _That night after dinner, there was a lot more excitement than usual. At last, it was time for capture the flag. When the plates were cleared away, the conch horn sounded and we all stood at our tables. Campers yelled and cheered as Annabeth and two of her siblings ran into the pavilion carrying a silk banner. It was about ten feet long, glistening grey, with a painting of a barn owl above an olive tree. From the opposite side of the pavilion, Clarisse and her buddies ran in with another banner, of identical size, but gaudy red, painted with a bloody spear and a boar's head._

 _I turned to Luke and yelled over the noise, "Those are the flags?"_

 _"Yeah."_

 _"Ares and Athena always lead the teams?"_

 _"Not always," he said. "But often."_

 _"So, if another cabin captures one, what do you do- repaint the flag?"_

 _He grinned. "You'll see;_ it happens quite often. _First we have to get one."_

 _"Whose side are we on?"_

 _He gave me a sly look, as if he knew something I didn't. The scar on his face made him look almost evil in the torchlight. "We've made a temporary alliance with Athena. Tonight, we get the flag from Ares. And you are going to help."_

 _The teams were announced. Athena had made an alliance with Apollo and Hermes, the two biggest cabins. Apparently, privileges had been traded-shower times, chore schedules, the best slots for activities-in order to win support. Ares had allied themselves with everybody else: Dionysus, Demeter, Aphrodite, and Hephaestus. From what I'd seen, Dionysus's kids were actually good athletes, but there were only two of them. Demeter's kids had the edge with nature skills and outdoor stuff but they weren't very aggressive. Aphrodite's sons and daughters I wasn't too worried about. They mostly sat out every activity and checked their reflections in the lake and did their hair and gossiped. Hephaestus's kids weren't pretty, and there were only four of them, but they were big and burly from working in the metal shop all day. They might be a problem. That, of course, left Ares's cabin: a dozen of the biggest, ugliest, meanest kids on Long Island, or anywhere else on the planet._ The only person everyone seemed wary of was Jasmine – the daughter of Poseidon who had made allegiance with Ares and she currently holds the laurels and the number of times a person has won CTF.

Chiron hammered his hoof on the marble. "Heroes!" he announced. "You know the rules. The creek is the boundary line. The entire forest is fair game. All magic items are allowed. The banner must be prominently displayed, and have no more than two guards. Prisoners may be disarmed, but may not be bound or gagged. No killing or maiming is allowed. I will serve as referee and battlefield medic. Arm yourselves!" He spread his hands, and the tables were suddenly covered with equipment: helmets, bronze swords, spears, oxhide shields coated in metal.

"Whoa," I said. "We're really supposed to use these?"

Luke looked at me as if I were crazy. "Unless you want to get skewered by your friends in cabin five. Here-Chiron thought these would fit. You'll be on border patrol."

My shield was the size of an NBA backboard, with a big caduceus in the middle. It weighed about a million pounds. I could have snowboarded on it fine, but I hoped nobody seriously expected me to run fast. My helmet, like all the helmets on Athena's side, had a blue horsehair plume on top. Ares and their allies had red plumes.

Annabeth yelled, "Blue team, forward!" We cheered and shook our swords and followed her down the path to the south woods. The red team yelled taunts at us as they headed off toward the north. I managed to catch up with Annabeth without tripping over my equipment.

"Hey." She kept marching. "So what's the plan?" I asked. "Got any magic items you can loan me?"

Her hand drifted toward her pocket, as if she were afraid I'd stolen something. "Just watch Clarisse's spear," she said. "You don't want that thing touching you. Otherwise, don't worry. We'll take the banner from Ares. Has Luke given you your job?"

"Border patrol, whatever that means."

"It's easy. Stand by the creek, keep the reds away. Leave the rest to me. Athena always has a plan."

She pushed ahead, leaving me in the dust. "Okay," I mumbled. "Glad you wanted me on your team."

*Jasmine's POV*

I was already near the flag and no one noticed. It wasn't until I had already grabbed the flag and legged it did anyone start to chase after me.

I crosses the border line and into home territory where I was hauled up onto the shoulders of my fellow red team.

Our side exploded into cheers. The blue banner shimmered and turned to sea green. The Athenian symbols were replaced with a trident, the symbol of cabin three.

Chiron catered out from the woods and blew the conch horn. The game was over. We'd won

We celebrated for a while until we heard Annabeth's voice.

 _"Step out of the water, Percy."_

 _"What-"_

 _"Just do it."_ After a while it became apparent onto what Annabeth was talking about. _"Oh, Styx," she cursed. "This is not good. I didn't want ... I assumed it would be Zeus..."_

I knew exactly what she was talking about but first something sounded through the field. _A howl ripped through the forest. The campers' cheering died instantly._

 _Chiron shouted "Stand ready! My bow!"_

I pulled out my weapons only to realise that the monster that appeared was a hellhound. And it was looking straight at me and Percy.

 _Nobody moved except Annabeth, who yelled, "Percy, run!" She tried to step in front of him, but the hound was too fast. It leaped over her-an enormous shadow with teeth-and just as it hit_ Percy, before bearing his teeth to me to which I striked him through. There was a cascade of thwacking sounds and from the hound's neck sprouted a cluster of arrows. The monster fell dead. _Chiron trotted up next to us, a bow in his hand, his face grim._

 _"Di immortales!" Annabeth said. "That's a hellhound from the Fields of Punishment. They don't...they're not supposed to…"_

 _"Someone summoned it," Chiron said. "Someone inside the camp."_

 _Clarisse yelled, "It's all Percy's fault! Percy summoned it!"_

 _"Be quiet, child," Chiron told her. We watched the body of the hellhound melt into shadow, soaking into the ground until it disappeared._

 _"You're wounded," Annabeth told_ Percy _. "Quick, Percy, get in the water."_

 _"I'm okay."_

 _"No, you're not," she said. "Chiron,_ Jasmine, _watch this."_

He _stepped back into the creek, the whole camp gathering around_ him.

 _Some of the campers gasped and I got a bad feeling._ Only I could heal that quickly and in water.

 _"Look, I-I don't know why,"_ He said, _trying to apologize. "I'm sorry..."_

 _"Percy," Annabeth said, pointing. "Um ..."_

 _The hologram of green light, spinning and gleaming. A three-tipped spear: a trident._ I recognise that from my own claiming and I paled. This will not go down well.

 _"Your father," Annabeth murmured. "This is really not good."_

You don't say.

 _"It is determined," Chiron announced._

 _All around me, campers started kneeling,_ and I refused.

 _"My father?"_ Percy _asked, completely bewildered._

 _"Poseidon," said Chiron. "Earthshaker, Stormbringer, Father of Horses. Hail, Perseus Jackson, Son of the Sea God."_


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: I got this idea when I wrote Zoe Evans, however I chose to make Jasmine a cousin of Harry and Lily and James are still alive. There is magic, however in this story, Hogwarts isn't what it is cracked up to be. All the links I use will be on my profile along with all the characters as I do not want to put it as a chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, Percy Jackson or Narnia, all the passages in books and dialogue from movies will be written in** _italics_ **so you know what it is that I definitely do not own.**

 **If you want any more information, review or PM me, but the main info that you may need is on my profile.**

 **Chapter 5 – A Quest**

 **Friday June 9** **th** **1995**

*Percy's POV*

Moments after, _Chiron moved me to cabin three_ , which I shared with Jasmine, however she has the 'don't care' rebellious attitude so I did not know whether she liked me, but she did take it upon herself to tell me about some of the powers she has from our dad, and what I could gain training my water powers. What is good however, is that we had half the cabin each, and she designed my half how I wanted it to.

 _I knew somebody at camp resented me, because one night I came into my cabin and found a mortal newspaper dropped inside the doorway, a copy of the New York Daily News, opened to the Metro page._

 _The article took me almost an hour to read, because the angrier I got, the more the words floated around on the page._

 _BOY AND MOTHER STILL MISSING AFTER FREAK CAR ACCIDENT_

 _BY EILEEN SMYTHE_

 _Sally Jackson and son Percy are still missing one week after their mysterious disappearance. The family's badly burned '78 Camaro was discovered last Saturday on a north Long Island road with the roof ripped off and the front axle broken. The car had flipped and skidded for several hundred feet before exploding._

 _Mother and son had gone for a weekend vacation to Montauk, but left hastily, under mysterious circumstances. Small traces of blood were found in the car and near the scene of the wreck, but there were no other signs of the missing Jacksons. Residents in the rural area reported seeing nothing unusual around the time of the accident._

 _Ms. Jackson's husband, Gabe Ugliano, claims that his stepson, Percy Jackson, is a troubled child who has been kicked out of numerous boarding schools and has expressed violent tendencies in the past._

 _Police would not say whether son Percy is a suspect in his mother's disappearance, but they have not ruled out foul play. Below are recent pictures of Sally Jackson and Percy. Police urge anyone with information to call the following toll-free crime-stoppers hotline._

 _The phone number was circled in black marker._

 _I wadded up the paper and threw it away, then flopped down in my bunk bed in the middle of my empty cabin._

 _"Lights out," I told myself miserably as Jasmine gave me free reign to turn off the lights if I want to._

*Jasmine's POV*

 _That night, I had my worst dream yet. I was running along the beach in a storm. This time, there was a city behind me. Not New York. The sprawl was different: buildings spread farther apart, palm trees and low hills in the distance._ I saw Percy a great distance away, and I know he saw me as well.

 _About a hundred yards down the surf, two men were fighting. They looked like TV wrestlers, muscular, with beards and long hair. Both wore flowing Greek tunics, one trimmed in blue, the other in green._

 _They grappled with each other, wrestled, kicked and head-butted, and every time they connected, lightning flashed, the sky grew darker, and the wind rose._

 _Over the roar of the storm, I could hear the blue-robed one yelling at the green-robed one, Give it back! Give it back! Like a kindergartner fighting over a toy._

 _The waves got bigger, crashing into the beach, spraying me with salt._

 _I_ heard Percy yell, _Stop it! Stop fighting!_

 _The ground shook. Laughter came from somewhere under the earth, and a voice so deep and evil it turned my blood to ice. Come down, little heroes, the voice crooned. Come down!_

 _The sand split beneath me, opening up a crevice straight down to the centre of the earth. My feet slipped, and darkness swallowed me._

 **The next morning, Saturday June 10** **th** **1996**

 _I woke up, sure I was falling._

 _I was still in bed in cabin three. My body told me it was morning, but it was dark outside, and thunder rolled across the hills. A storm was brewing. I hadn't dreamed that._ I looked towards the other side of the room to see Percy in the same state as me.

 _I heard a clopping sound at the door, a hoof knocking on the threshold._

 _"Come in?"_ Percy asked.

 _Grover trotted inside, looking worried. "Mr. D wants to see you_ two."

 _"Why?"_

 _"He wants to kill... I mean, I'd better let him tell you."_

We both got dressed out of our pyjamas wandering exactly why we were getting summons.

 _Over Long Island Sound, the sky looked like ink soup coming to a boil. A hazy curtain of rain was coming in our direction._ Percy _asked Grover if we needed an umbrella._

 _"No," he said. "It never rains here unless we want it to."_

Percy _pointed at the storm. "What the heck is that, then?"_

I glanced at the sky as well. This is not going to go down well.

Grover _glanced uneasily at the sky. "It'll pass around us. Bad weather always does."_

 _But this storm...this one was huge. I was not sure it would be true this time._

 _At the volleyball pit, the kids from Apollo's cabin were playing a morning game against the satyrs. Dionysus's twins were walking around in the strawberry fields, making the plants grow. Everybody was going about their normal business, but they looked tense. They kept their eyes on the storm._

The three of us _walked up to the front porch of the Big House. Dionysus sat at the pinochle table in his tiger-striped Hawaiian shirt with his Diet Coke, just as he had on my first day. Chiron sat across the table in his fake wheel-chair. They were playing against invisible opponents-two sets of cards hovering in the air._

 _"Well, well," Mr. D said without looking up. "Our little celebrity."_

 _"Come closer," Mr. D said. "And don't expect me to kowtow to you, mortal, just because old Barnacle Beard is your father."_

 _A net of lightning flashed across the clouds. Thunder shook the windows of the house._

 _"Blah, blah, blah," Dionysus said._

 _Chiron feigned interest in his pinochle cards. Grover cowered by the railing, his hooves clopping back and forth._

 _"If I had my way," Dionysus said, "I would cause your molecules to erupt in flames. We'd sweep up the ashes and be done with a lot of trouble. But Chiron seems to feel this would be against my mission at this cursed camp: to keep you little brats safe from harm."_

 _"Spontaneous combustion is a form of harm, Mr. D," Chiron put in._

 _"Nonsense," Dionysus said. "Boy wouldn't feel a thing. Nevertheless, I've agreed to restrain myself I'm thinking of turning you into a dolphin instead, sending you back to your father."_

 _"Mr. D-" Chiron warned._

 _"Oh, all right," Dionysus relented. "There's one more option. But it's deadly foolishness." Dionysus rose, and the invisible players' cards dropped to the table. "I'm off to Olympus for the emergency meeting. If the boy is still here when I get back, I'll turn him into an Atlantic bottlenose. Do you understand? And Perseus Jackson, if you're at all smart, you'll see that's a much more sensible choice than what Chiron feels you must do."_ He then turned to me. "You are to do the same by request of my father.

 _Dionysus picked up a playing card, twisted it, and it became a security pass. He snapped his fingers._

 _The air seemed to fold and bend around him. He became a hologram, then a wind, then he was gone, leaving only the smell of fresh-pressed grapes lingering behind._

 _Chiron smiled at us, but he looked tired and strained. "Sit, Percy, Jasmine, please. And Grover."_

 _We did._

 _Chiron laid his cards on the table, a winning hand he hadn't gotten to use._

 _"Tell me, Percy," he said. "What did you make of the hellhound?"_

 _"It scared me," Percy said. "If you hadn't shot it, I'd be dead."_

 _"You'll meet worse, Percy. Far worse, before you're done."_

 _"Done...with what?"_

 _"Your quest, of course. Will you accept it?"_

 _I glanced at Grover, who was crossing his fingers._

"Chiron," I said, " _you haven't told_ us _what it is yet."_

 _Chiron grimaced. "Well, that's the hard part, the details."_

 _Thunder rumbled across the valley. The storm clouds had now reached the edge of the beach. As far as I could see, the sky and the sea were boiling together._

 _"Poseidon and Zeus," I said._

Percy continued on. _"They're fighting over something valuable...something that was stolen, aren't they?"_

 _Chiron and Grover exchanged looks._

 _Chiron sat forward in his wheelchair. "How did you know that?"_

I tuned out the rest until I heard about the Oracle.

 _"Only the Oracle can determine." Chiron stroked his bristly beard. "Nevertheless, Percy, you are correct. Your father and Zeus are having their worst quarrel in centuries. They are fighting over something valuable that was stolen. To be precise: a lightning bolt."_

I shot round to Chiron. "What? He let his lightning bolt get stolen? How?"

 _Percy laughed nervously. "A what?"_

 _"Do not take this lightly," Chiron warned. "I'm not talking about some tinfoil-covered zigzag you'd see in a second-grade play. I'm talking about a two-foot-long cylinder of high-grade celestial bronze, capped on both ends with god-level explosives."_

 _"Oh."_

 _"Zeus's master bolt," Chiron said, getting worked up now. "The symbol of his power, from which all other lightning bolts are patterned. The first weapon made by the Cyclopes for the war against the Titans, the bolt that sheered the top off Mount Etna and hurled Kronos from his throne; the master bolt, which packs enough power to make mortal hydrogen bombs look like firecrackers."_

 _"And it's missing?"_

 _"Stolen," Chiron said._

 _"By who?"_

 _"By whom."_ I corrected.

 _"By you." Chiron said_ in answer to Percy. _"At least" Chiron held up a hand "that's what Zeus thinks. During the winter solstice, at the last council of the gods, Zeus and Poseidon had an argument. The usual nonsense: 'Mother Rhea always liked you best,' Air dis-asters are more spectacular than sea disasters,' et cetera. Afterward, Zeus realized his master bolt was missing, taken from the throne room under his very nose. He immediately blamed Poseidon. Now, a god cannot usurp another god's symbol of power directly-that is forbidden by the most ancient of divine laws. But Zeus believes your father convinced a human hero to take it."_

 _"But I didn't-"_

 _"Patience and listen, child," Chiron said. "Zeus has good reason to be suspicious. The forges of the Cyclopes are under the ocean, which gives Poseidon some influence over the makers of his brother's lightning. Zeus believes Poseidon has taken the master bolt, and is now secretly having the Cyclopes build an arsenal of illegal copies, which might be used to topple Zeus from his throne. The only thing Zeus wasn't sure about was which hero Poseidon used to steal the bolt. Now Poseidon has openly claimed you as his son. You were in New York over the winter holidays. You could easily have snuck into Olympus. Zeus believes he has found his thief."_

"Really, Percy is ignorant, no offense, and has only just recently found out he is a demigod, plus I have been watching him, and he cannot steal anything to save his life. If anything, I am surprised he isn't blaming me." I was highly amused at the assumption.

Chiron turned to me then. "He did suspect you, until all the other gods and goddesses proved you to be innocent, as you have made quite an impression on all of them. Plus, I am sure that you being the champion or blessed by them all, has them taking over a protective role of you."

 _"But I've never even been to Olympus! Zeus is crazy!" Percy said after this._

 _Chiron and Grover glanced nervously at the sky. The clouds didn't seem to be parting around us, as Grover had promised. They were rolling straight over our valley, sealing us in like a coffin lid._

 _"Er, Percy ...?" Grover said. "We don't use the c-word to describe the Lord of the Sky."_

 _"Perhaps paranoid," Chiron suggested. "Then again, Poseidon has tried to unseat Zeus before. I believe that was question thirty-eight on your final exam..." He looked at me as if he actually expected me to remember question thirty-eight._

 _"Something about a golden net?"_ Percy _guessed. "Poseidon and Hera and a few other gods...they, like, trapped Zeus and wouldn't let him out until he promised to be a better ruler, right?"_

 _"Correct," Chiron said. "And Zeus has never trusted Poseidon since. Of course, Poseidon denies stealing the master bolt. He took great offense at the accusation. The two have been arguing back and forth for months, threatening war. And now, you've come along-the proverbial last straw."_

 _"But I'm just a kid!"_

 _"Percy," Grover cut in, "if you were Zeus, and you already thought your brother was plotting to overthrow you, then your brother suddenly admitted he had broken the sacred oath he took after World War II, that he's fathered a new mortal hero who might be used as a weapon against you...Wouldn't that put a twist in your toga?"_

 _"But I didn't do anything. Poseidon-my dad-he didn't really have this master bolt stolen, did he?"_

 _Chiron sighed. "Most thinking observers would agree that thievery is not Poseidon's style. But the Sea God is too proud to try convincing Zeus of that. Zeus has demanded that Poseidon return the bolt by the summer solstice. That's June twenty-first, ten days from now. Poseidon wants an apology for being called a thief by the same date. I hoped that diplomacy might prevail, that Hera or Demeter or Hestia would make the two brothers see sense. But your arrival has inflamed Zeus's temper. Now neither god will back down. Unless someone intervenes, unless the master bolt is found and returned to Zeus before the solstice, there will be war. And do you know what a full-fledged war would look like, Percy?"_

 _"Bad?"_ He _guessed._

I face-palmed at this, really? Bad? That is a great understatement.

 _"Imagine the world in chaos. Nature at war with itself. Olympians forced to choose sides between Zeus and Poseidon. Destruction. Carnage. Millions dead. Western civilization turned into a battleground so big it will make the Trojan War look like a water-balloon fight."_

 _"Bad,"_ He _repeated._

 _"And you, Percy Jackson, would be the first to feel Zeus's wrath."_

 _It started to rain. Volleyball players stopped their game and stared in stunned silence at the sky._

 _"So I have to find the stupid bolt,"_ Percy _said._

"Cough 'we' cough." I coughed.

 _"And return it to Zeus."_

 _"What better peace offering," Chiron said, "than to have the children of Poseidon return Zeus's property?"_

 _"If Poseidon doesn't have it, where is the thing?"_

 _"I believe I know." Chiron's expression was grim. "Part of a prophecy I had years ago ... well, some of the lines make sense to me, now. But before I can say more, you must officially take up the quest. You must seek the counsel of the Oracle."_

 _"Why can't you tell me where the bolt is beforehand?"_

 _"Because if I did, you would be too afraid to accept the challenge."_

He _swallowed. "Good reason."_

 _"You agree then?"_

 _Percy looked at Grover, who nodded encouragingly_ and me, where I shrugged with a slight smile which he understood.

 _"All right," Percy said. "It's better than being turned into a dolphin."_

"Well…" I tilted my head, contemplating this.

 _"Then it's time you consulted the Oracle," Chiron said. "Go upstairs, Percy Jackson, to the attic. When you come back down, assuming you're still sane, we will talk more."_

*Percy's POV*

After that advice, I went up the stairs.

 _Four flights up, the stairs ended under a green trap-door. I pulled the cord. The door swung down, and a wooden ladder clattered into place. The warm air from above smelled like mildew and rotten wood and something else ... a smell I remembered from biology class. Reptiles. The smell of snakes._

 _I held my breath and climbed. The attic was filled with Greek hero junk: armour stands covered in cobwebs; once-bright shields pitted with rust; old leather steamer trunks plastered with stickers saying ITHAKA, CIRCE'S ISLE, and LAND OF THE AMAZONS. One long table was stacked with glass jars filled with pickled things-severed hairy claws, huge yellow eyes, various other parts of monsters. A dusty mounted trophy on the wall looked like a giant snake's head, but with horns and a full set of shark's teeth. The plaque read, HYDRA HEAD #1, WOODSTOCK, N.Y., 1969._

 _By the window, sitting on a wooden tripod stool, was the most gruesome memento of all: a mummy._

 _Not the wrapped-in-cloth kind, but a human female body shriveled to a husk. She wore a tie-dyed sundress, lots of beaded necklaces, and a headband over long black hair. The skin of her face was thin and leathery over her skull, and her eyes were glassy white slits, as if the real eyes had been replaced by marbles; she'd been dead a long, long time._

 _Looking at her sent chills up my back. And that was before she sat up on her stool and opened her mouth. A green mist poured from the mummy's mouth, coiling over the floor in thick tendrils, hissing like twenty thousand snakes. I stumbled over myself trying to get to the trap-door, but it slammed shut._

 _Inside my head, I heard a voice, slithering into one ear and coiling around my brain: I am the spirit of Delphi, speaker of the prophecies of Phoebus Apollo, slayer of the mighty Python. Approach, seeker, and ask._

 _I wanted to say, no thanks, wrong door, just looking for the bath-room. But I forced myself to take a deep breath._

 _The mummy wasn't alive. She was some kind of gruesome receptacle for something else, the power that was now swirling around me in the green mist. But its presence didn't feel evil, like my demonic math teacher Mrs. Dodds or the Minotaur. It felt more like the Three Fates I'd seen knitting the yarn outside the highway fruit stand: ancient, powerful, and definitely not human. But not particularly interested in killing me, either._

 _I got up the courage to ask, "What is my destiny?"_

 _The mist swirled more thickly, collecting right in front of me and around the table with the pickled monster-part jars. Suddenly there were four men sitting around the table, playing cards. Their faces became clearer. It was Smelly Gabe and his buddies._

 _My fists clenched, though I knew this poker party couldn't be real. It was an illusion, made out of mist._

 _Gabe turned toward me and spoke in the rasping voice of the Oracle: You_ and three _shall go west, and face the god who has turned._

 _His buddy on the right looked up and said in the same voice: You shall find what was stolen, and see it safely returned._

 _The guy on the left threw in two poker chips, then said: You shall he betrayed by one who calls you a friend._

 _Finally, Eddie, our building super, delivered the worst line of all: And you shall fail to save what matters most, in the end._

 _The figures began to dissolve. At first I was too stunned to say anything, but as the mist retreated, coiling into a huge green serpent and slithering back into the mouth of the mummy, I cried, "Wait! What do you mean? What friend? What will I fail to save?"_

 _The tail of the mist snake disappeared into the mummy's mouth. She reclined back against the wall. Her mouth closed tight, as if it hadn't been open in a hundred years. The attic was silent again, abandoned, nothing but a room full of mementos._

 _I got the feeling that I could stand here until I had cob-webs, too, and I wouldn't learn anything else._

 _My audience with the Oracle was over._

*Jasmine's POV*

 _"Well?" Chiron asked_ Percy as I lounged in my seat.

He _slumped into a chair at the pinochle table. "She said I would retrieve what was stolen."_

 _Grover sat forward, chewing excitedly on the remains of a Diet Coke can. "That's great!"_

 _"What did the Oracle say exactly?" Chiron pressed. "This is important."_

 _"She...she said I_ and three others _would go west and face a god who had turned. I would retrieve what was stolen and see it safely returned."_

 _"I knew it," Grover said._

 _Chiron didn't look satisfied. "Anything else?"_

 _"No,"_ Percy said after a while. _"That's about it."_

Being descended from the God of Truth, I do know when someone is lying and Percy is.

Chiron studied his face. _"Very well, Percy. But know this: The Oracle's words often have double meanings. Don't dwell on them too much. The truth is not always clear until events come to pass."_

 _"Okay,"_ Percy _said, anxious to change topics_. _"So where do_ we _go? Who's this god in the west?"_

 _"Ah, think, Percy," Chiron said. "If Zeus and Poseidon weaken each other in a war, who stands to gain?"_

 _"Somebody else who wants to take over?_ " He guessed.

 _"Yes, quite. Someone who harbours a grudge, who has been unhappy with his lot since the world was divided eons ago, whose kingdom would grow powerful with the deaths of millions. Someone who hates his brothers for forcing him into an oath to have no more children, an oath that both of them have now broken."_

"He won't do anything like this," I expressed to Chiron. "I know my uncle and he wouldn't want this." I had another idea to who would gain something from all of this.

 _"Hades."_ Percy said.

 _Chiron nodded. "The Lord of the Dead is the only possibility."_

 _A scrap of aluminium dribbled out of Grover's mouth. "Whoa, wait. Wh-what?"_

 _"A Fury came after Percy," Chiron reminded him. "She watched the young man until she was sure of his identity, then tried to kill him. Furies obey only one lord: Hades."_

 _"Yes, but-but Hades hates all heroes," Grover protested. "Especially if he has found out Percy is a son of Poseidon..."_

 _"A hellhound got into the forest," Chiron continued. "Those can only be summoned from the Fields of Punishment, and it had to be summoned by someone within the camp. Hades must have a spy here. He must suspect Poseidon will try to use Percy to clear his name. Hades would very much like to kill this young half-blood before he can take on the quest."_

 _"Great,"_ Said half-blood muttered. _"That's two major gods who want to kill me."_

"They all love me apparently." I shrugged and tuned out until a certain part of the conversation.

 _"So let me get this straight,"_ Percy _said. "I'm supposed go to the Underworld and confront the Lord of the Dead."_

 _"Check," Chiron said._

 _"Find the most powerful weapon in the universe."_

 _"Check."_

 _"And get it back to Olympus before the summer solstice, in ten days."_

 _"That's about right."_

I looked at Grover, who gulped down the ace of hearts.

"Did I mention that Maine is very nice this time of year?" he asked weakly.

 _"You don't have to go,"_ I _told him._

Percy agreed. _"I can't ask that of you._

 _"Oh..." He shifted his hooves. "No... it's just that satyrs and underground places...well..."_

 _He took a deep breath, then stood, brushing the shredded cards and aluminium bits off his T-shirt. "You saved my life, Percy. If... if you're serious about wanting me along, I won't let you down."_

 _"All the way, G-man."_ Percy _turned to Chiron. "So where do we go? The Oracle just said to go west."_

 _"The entrance to the Underworld is always in the west. It moves from age to age, just like Olympus. Right now, of course, it's in America."_

 _"Where?"_

 _Chiron looked surprised. "I thought that would be obvious enough. The entrance to the Underworld is in Los Angeles."_

"The City of Angels." I hummed.

 _"Oh,"_ Percy _said. "Naturally. So we just get on a plane-"_

"NO!" I shouted.

 _"No!" Grover shrieked. "Percy, what are you thinking? Have you ever been on a plane in your life?"_

Percy shook his head.

 _"Percy, think," Chiron said. "You are the son of the Sea God. Your father's bitterest rival is Zeus, Lord of the Sky. Your mother knew better than to trust you in an airplane. You would be in Zeus's domain. You would never come down again alive."_

 _Overhead, lightning crackled. Thunder boomed._

"Okay," Percy said. "So, I'll travel overland."

 _"That's right," Chiron said. "Three companions may accompany you. Grover is one._ Jasmine is another on request by Lord Zeus and she offered as well. _The other has already volunteered, if you will accept her help."_

 _"Gee,"_ Percy said, _feigning surprise. "Who else would be stupid enough to volunteer for a quest like this?"_

I smirked as _the air shimmered behind Chiron._

 _Annabeth became visible, stuffing her Yankees cap into her back pocket._

 _"I've been waiting a long time for a quest, seaweed brain," she said. "Athena is no fan of Poseidon, but if you're going to save the world, I'm the best person to keep you from messing up._ And I like Jasmine, so I would gladly help her."

 _"If you do say so yourself,"_ Percy _said. "I suppose you have a plan, wise girl?"_

 _Her cheeks coloured. "Do you want my help or not?"_

 _"A quartet," I said_ looking at the other three. _"That'll work."_

 _"Excellent," Chiron said. "This afternoon, we can take you as far as the bus terminal in Manhattan. After that, you are on your own."_

 _Lightning flashed. Rain poured down on the meadows that were never supposed to have violent weather._

 _"No time to waste," Chiron said. "I think you should all get packing."_


End file.
